The Imaginarium of Doctor Lokizzle

by Liam “Loki” Belcher

Remember when you were a kid and your teacher would ask you what you wanted to be when you grew up? I remember being asked this question as an innocent young lad and my mind would always go to some of my gaming heroes as well as wanting to be a footballer/astronaut/accountant. Although being a highly paid accountant was something I’d dreamed of from the age of 4, it just couldn’t quite excite me as much as wanting to become the next red pixel from the latest Atari hit game. I swear, that red pixel just…just had it, you know?

When I was a small gaming prodigy (long before Jason Lake picked me up to play Barbie Island 3 at a professional level), I had one character I wanted to be above all else. That character was James Pond. James Pond was a rather obvious take on James Bond. They did this by rather cleverly removing the B from “Bond” and replacing it with a P. As if that wasn’t smart enough, they put him in a little tuxedo style waistcoat on the front cover of the game. Think about that – A FISH…in a WAISTCOAT. The purpose of the game was to collect gold bars or keys or some such items and they would unlock something or other and you would win…good times? Ok, so I realize I’m not making a compelling case for the game, but from what little memory I have of an awesome game, I still remember the fact that I wanted to be James Pond.

The game that changed it all for me was a rather ironic one that came out many years later. Between James Pond – Underwater Agent and this game coming out, I had floated in a land of great games but non that made me want to become anything close to a fish in a waistcoat. The game, of which I shall tell you the tale of, is Goldeneye64. Every time I see a “Top 50 Games of all time” list, I always see G64 easily making the top 15. For me, it was literally one of the best games of all time. To call this game the Mona Lisa of gaming would be an insult, not because G64 is bad, but because Mona Lisa is just a painting of a woman sitting there, staring out in a rather disappointed manner (I know this from when I saw it in Paris last year and I am course an expert on facial expressions). If I wanted that, I’d just tell my girlfriend the joke about the difference between jam and peanut butter. If you don’t get what I mean then I apologise deeply but you could Google the answer to that joke…just saying.

G64, for me, encapsulates everything that can go right with a game of its time. It was graphically competent (hahaha, I know), had a great storyline (couldn’t really go wrong when it’s based on an awesome movie), fantastically fun multiplayer and cheats that made me literally rofl an entire waffle. However there is something about G64 that some people don’t know, something minor and barely noticeable. When G64 was released, the universe was never the same again with stars realigning and the dead coming back to life… not in a zombie apocalypse kind of way though. It was more like a “Casper the Friendly Ghost – Living Edition!” kind of way. This was simply due to how awesome the game was…true story. I remember playing G64 and thinking “Damn, I need that watch that’s also a PAUSE menu”, yeah you heard me a freaking PAUSE menu…which also doubled up as a stun dart gun, laser cutter, remote mine detonator and time piece! I mean, who didn’t want to be Bond, from the movies alone?! Now you’re telling me I can BE James Bond in a game? It was too much too take but at the same time still not close enough for me.

How many of you out there still want to just go nuts and go into a Matrix style world where you can be whoever or whatever you want? Personally I think the idea of being Solid Snake and crawling around in a box with eye holes at work would be too awesome to pass up on. Or maybe even just dressing up as Dizzy the Egg and bouncing round the place like the adventurous egg that he was? Games were always a way of unlocking that childhood imagination of wanting to slay dragons and play with your imaginary friend. It’s simply the fact that your imaginary friend is now in full HD graphics and can full interact with you. The concept of imaginations throughout the world has never changed, it’s just that the technology is now  able to convey it fully these days. So, whilst I’m brainstorming awesome new ways to make games a real life thing, why don’t you tell me some of the characters that you wanted to be as a kid, or still do? I love seeing some of the hilarious costumes people make for CosPlay conventions or the ideas people post for games. It’s nice to know that physically or mentally, someone, somewhere is putting their imagination into action. So if you know of any great pictures, feel free to post them. Pictures of cute women dressing up as Link from Zelda are perfectly ok with me. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go play with Spyro the Dragon in my garden…

A Look Into the TR Practice Phase

by Sascha “Yiska” Heinsich

We are a couple of weeks into the TR practice phase and there is really only two more weeks to go until it gets serious and the tournament phase starts. For those unfamiliar with what’s going on right now, Blizzard opened their yearly tournament realm on which you can play whatever character with current season gear you’d like. The top 8 teams from each continent in the 3 vs 3 bracket will then be invited to the “regionals” (still in question for Europe). From this stage on, the tournament will be held offline and the top 2 of each event from the respective continent head to Blizzcon to battle for the crown of the world champion as well as a $75000 dollar prize. In short, if you take WoW Arena remotely serious, you definitely want to be there.

As we are in the practice phase right now and most pro teams are still goofing around with different comps or specs, you should take the following information with a grain of salt. The ladder will (most likely) be reset on the 27th of May and that’s when it really counts. You will see more of the big names going into serious mode. Right now, looking at the top 20 there are still some interesting topics to explore.

A new Beast Cleave rising?

Complexity.Black, at that time still playing with the new shoutcaster for MLG, Nathan “Kintt” Quin, invented Beast Cleave for MLG Dallas ’09 and had an amazing run with that comp for many tournaments. It begged the question why no one really tried to mimic their strategy for 4 consecutive tournaments of which most were dominated by the team. Not even the top dogs of counter combing – x6tence trained the comp and it seemed like coL.Black was the only Beast Cleave on the WoW horizon. Moving into season 8 gear, despite the overall success of the team on live servers, it was still unclear if the comp would be viable this tournament season. As it turns out, a team called “Hawk Gaming” is taking the top position on the US TR with an impressive winning record of 161-29. Snutz reported on this weeks ArenaCast (which you can check out here) that this team does play really well and they pulled things off that “blew his mind”. Whether or not they can compete with Black or if they can reach for a top 8 spot remains to be seen. What we can gather from this, even in this stage of the tournament, is that Beast Cleave is far from done and things certainly aren’t looking too bad for Twixz & Co. on paper.

WLD still viable?

Sitting at 6th place with a 75% win ratio is the team of Nadagast, Hoodrich and Velsus playing the seemingly dateless comp of Warrior/Warlock/Druid. The team has been turning some heads even on live ladders and have been the first team in the world to reach 3k rating this season. What’s really interesting to see is how well they do compared to the WLD veterans “Plasma TV inc” over in Europe. Inflame, Paperkat and Carecoala, who won Blizzcon ’08, have been struggeling so far as their 59% win ratio at 2.2k indicates. The question is, are they still too rusty to compete with the top dogs or is it the European meta game that doesn’t favor WLD as much? Certainly we will find out once the practice phase is over. Keep in mind, all it takes is one crazy night where you play your A-Game and you meet manageable teams and you got your self a ticket to regionals by sitting it out. A lot of strategizing and certainly dodging is needed to make it to the top. As it looks right now, there are far more than only 8 top notch teams competing for the top spots that have been flying below the radar for many community insiders.

Where is RMP? Is RLS the RMP of the future?

At a concerning 18th spot sits “BAR” with 67%, the only RMP in the US top 20 at the moment. Not too many people seem to believe in the comp anymore and when Hydra’s RMP isn’t on top of the Cyclone-EU ladder, the alarm in the elite RMP head quarters should be ringing. Not only that, but also coL.Red seem to have abandoned RMP, at least as a ladder comp, to qualify for TR and they will probably try their luck with RLD. While skimming through the top 20, one comp seems to be what RMP has been for the beginning of the last season, Rogue/Lock/Shaman. RLS has been around for a while now and it feels like after the victory of Team EG/Fnatic at Cebit, coupled with the upgraded gear, many teams seem to be confident in the line up and perform quite well both in Europe and in North America. Was Cebit a symbol for RLS to be the representitive of the Caster/Healer/Melee trifecta over RMP? Certainly RLS is classified as a “skill comp” by most community members and the possibilities of this comp seem mouth watering. As always, we should not forget about the Koreans and especially Button Bashers. Whenever we thought RMP was done, they showed us that the comp still has room for improvement and the potential to win tournaments.

Wizard cleave not as dominant as predicted?

When I first opened the top 20s, I thought I would see a Wizard cleave roll-fest. As it turns out, there are only three Harry Potter representatives in the NA top 20, which is about as much as there are TSG teams. Have we been fooled by our emotions into thinking that only because Wizard cleave is the most annoying to play against, they are also the hardest opponents? Shouldn’t there be more Wizard cleaves up there of top players goofing around with these comps, now that it doesn’t matter? Where are the Elemental Shamans, the designated flavor of the month class to hate right now? To beat a top team by critting and one shotting the opponent can be ridiculously easy at times, but is it enough to count on the lottery every game? It certainly doesn’t look like it. It will be interesting to see how this will turn out in the tournament phase as well as at the upcoming MLG qualifiers for the tournament after Columbus. To date, Team EG’s Pookz/Azael/Tenderloin have been the only team to ever attend an offline event with a Wizard Cleave comp. Until someone proves me wrong, I’ll have to assume that we were over-reacting.

After the merger of the Oslo Lions lineup and existing cbteam players in early 2010, the team has announced that they are no longer together and are officially marked “dead.” Their spokeman had this to say to HLTV.org:

It is always sad to see the end of a team, no matter how long or short it has existed.  When cbteam first started, i was like a child, thinking we might have an international top team from Norway again. And through its time, cbteam showed some truely great results online.

When the team failed to attend The Gathering, I – aswell as many others started to get a bad feeling. The hopes stayed up, but when we realised the deal with 4Kings was drowned, it seemed like the end. And it probably was.

I will keep hoping for a new topteam – and with kalle and tacky leaving for Lions, I hope they can make it.

Prior to the announcement, cbteam was:

Sondre “REAL” Svanevik
Preben “prb” Gammelsæter
Tommy “syrtekz” Skoglund

Source: HLTV.org